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Gary Neville, speaking on the It's Called Soccer podcast, has been talking Liverpool's summer transfer business

Liverpool are ready to break the British transfer record to sign Bayer Leverkusen and Germany star Florian Wirtz.

The Reds have already had a £109m bid turned down.

But with the player keen to move to the new Premier League champions after spurning the advances of Bayern Munich and Manchester City, there is an expectation that a deal will get done.

But with Leverkusen holding out for a fee in the region of £125m, it appears that Liverpool will have to break the British transfer record set by Chelsea when they signed Moises Caicedo for £115m from Brighton & Hove Albion in the summer of 2023.

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The capture of Wirtz would arguably be even more exciting.

The 22-year-old is regarded as one of the best playmakers in world football and if he does indeed make the move to Merseyside, he would follow in the footsteps of his Leverkusen team-mate Jeremie Frimpong, who joined the Reds in a £29.5m deal last week.

It is clear that Liverpool, who are also targeting £45m-rated Bournemouth left-back Milos Kerkez, are not resting on their laurels after winning the title in head coach Arne Slot's first season in charge.

And Gary Neville, while 'slightly surprised' at the amount of money the Reds are willing to shell out on Wirtz, is impressed.

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The Manchester United legend spoke about his old rivals on the It's Called Soccer podcast on the US Overlap channel.

So signing Wirtz is fantastic.

"Frimpong and then there’s talk of Kerkez as well, deals with their right and left-back situations.

"So to get those three done, if they were to get those three done quite quickly, would be smart business.

But I wouldn’t have expected anything else from Liverpool.

"Maybe slightly surprised that they’ve gone so heavy on Wirtz in terms of the fee.

He waited 12 months for a player to sign."

The only player Slot signed during his debut campaign was Federico Chiesa, who has admitted he may leave the club this summer after being reduced to a bit-part role.

Liverpool are likely to make a number of sales to help balance their outgoings, which will also include the £29m they had already agreed to pay Valencia for goalkeeper Giorgi Mamardashvili.

But the Reds have managed to bring in around £10m after doing a deal with Real Madrid to release Trent Alexander-Arnold early from his contract in order for the right-back to play in the FIFA Club World Cup for his new club.

Given Alexander-Arnold had just a month left to run on his Anfield deal, Neville was blown away by the money Madrid handed over.

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"Honestly, no, I mean, I’m stunned by that really, that £10m has changed hands for, but there is £100m pounds at stake in this World Club Championship and Real Madrid have got a great chance of doing it," he said.

"So you imagine if he plays in this tournament, they haven’t got a right back that’s playing there naturally at this moment in time.
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